Butterflies, and scorpion clues

In the morning Esme and I discussed which place we would pick for
a nice walk. After looking at several options, we decided on Coacoatzintla,
a small town that is quite close to Xalapa. Before the town, as seen from
Banderilla, the road crosses an old lava flow caused by an eruption of "El Volcancillo" (the little volcano).
We decided to have a nice walk there, but to the right of the road that goes from Banderilla to Coacoatzintla.
About one and a half year ago (see: El Zacatal: The case of the murdered mannequin) we had walked to the left of this road, and we wanted
to explore the "other side".

A butterfly on a road in the town of Coacoatzintla.

When we arrived in Coacoatzintla we started to walk, roughly going into the direction of the
place we wanted to walk. Esme was quite hungry, and when she smelled freshly baked bread, we
entered a bakery. Inside it was quite dark, and it smelled really nice. In the back of the bakery
a huge wood fire was burning in an oven. In the front, two men were busy making bread on a large
table. Esme bought a "concha", a round piece of bread ("pan").

We continued our walk, and after we discovered we had walked into the wrong direction for about
one hour (we ended up in the hills), Esme suggested that we should take a taxi back to Coacoatzintla,
and then ask the driver to drop us at the place we wanted to start our walk. And so we did.

The landscape "in front" of Coacoatzintla.

The taxi driver was asked to stop when we saw pine trees to our left (as seen from Coacoatzintla), and
we walked into the forest. The forest floor showed huge pieces of volcanic rock, so we were at the right
place. It was quite hot, and we were both happy to walk now and then into the little shadow provided
by the pine trees.

Yellow butterflies mating.

After some walking, and looking under dead pieces of wood for wild life, we ended up at an more
open spot. It looked like volcanic rock had been removed by people. We also noticed a big cave-in
like there had been a bubble in the hot lava when it flowed, and ages after the flow turned into
rock, the "blister" had given in.

A cave-in of volcanic rock.

We started to follow the edge of the pine forest in front of us into the "right" direction,
and suddenly Esme spotted a big lizard sitting on the vertical part of the edge of another
cave-in. I tried to get as close as possible with the camera zoomed in to the max, but the
resulting photo is quite unsharp. But based on the picture I would say it's a spiny
lizard (Sceloporus species).

Spiny lizard (Sceloporus species).

When I got just a little closer the lizard entered the crack in the volcanic rock and was gone
from view. We continued our walk, following the edge of a pine forest. I looked under stones,
and under one I noticed a small tarantula. When it walked out of it's silk covered burrow, I
took a picture.

A small tarantula on top of its burrow under a stone.

While I took the picture, I noticed something else: a part of the exuvia (cast-off skin) of a
scorpion. I already had the feeling that today we would find Centruroides gracilis (Florida Bark Scorpion),
a scorpion species that can easily be found in Veracruz and several other states of Mexico. The landscape
in front of the pine forest looked right to me. And now we had proof, that scorpions were living
here.

Tail segments of the exuvia of a scorpion, notice the SAT.

In the above photo you can clearly see the small bump under the actual stinger. This bump is called
the subaculear tubercle (SAT), and Centruroides species do have this feature. And I was quite sure that
this was the exuvia of a Centruroides gracilis. We continued our walk into the pine forest, and I kept
looking under volcanic rocks for more clues of scorpions living here.

Underside of a scorpion exuvia, probably belonging to Centruroides gracilis.

And I was lucky, since under a stone just a little into the forest I found another, a bit larger, exuvia. The
scorpion was probably up side down, on the underside of the stone, when it got out of its old exoskeleton, because
when I lifted the stone, I saw the underside of the exuvia. I moved the stone back into position and took a picture
of the habitat.

Centruroides gracilis habitat, volcanic rock in a pine forest.

We continued our walk, deeper into the forest. I kept looking under stones, and in a bit more open spot I found
another scorpion exuvia. No scorpions so far, but clear clues that they either enter the forest, or live in the
forest. I had already decided to give the field in front of the forest we entered a closer look on our way back,
because I wanted to have some pictures of living scorpions.

Centruroides gracilis exuvia

The exuvia was resting on top of the silk tunnel made by a spider, and again upside down. The SAT
(subaculear tubercle) is clearly visible in the close-up below, and one can almost count the number
of pectinal teeth of each "comb" forming the V shape at the underside of a scorpion, which can
be used as an identification key and sometimes to sex the scorpion.